Chapter 4 Nanomaterials: Fabrication

4.1

Goals

Overview of fabrication and synthesis methods for nanoparticles. Read: P. S. Hale et al., J. Chem. Educ. 82 (5), 775 (2005). Growth kinetics and modeling of ZnO nanoparticles.

4.2

Introduction

The two basic approaches to making nanostructures involve either a top-down approach whereby an existing solid is gradually reduced in size using some external radiation and/or chemical, and a bottom-up approach whereby the nanostructure is built atom by atom from scratch.

4.3

Lithography

One can start with an existing extended structure and reduce the structure using a radiation and/or chemical. This has been used used to make quantum wires and dots. Commonly used radiation are photon, electrons and ions. For photons, one typically uses a polymerized organic material; for electrons one uses inorganic materials such as SiO2 . Lithography can also be achieved via impression using a hard mold and a soft resist. 49

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CHAPTER 4. NANOMATERIALS: FABRICATION

This process of lithography consists of a few basic steps (Fig. 4.1). A stepwise description for a polymer resist is now given [7]: The resist is dissolved in a solvent to convert into a liquid form. The substrate is coated with the resist on a turntable (spin-coating). Any excess solvent can be evaporated by raising the substrate temperature (typically around 1000 , soft bake). The resist is exposed to the lithographic beam. The treated sample is placed in a solvent in order to develop the treated resist. A post-exposure bake is carried out (near 1200 ) to remove excess solvent. A chemical is used to etch into the active layer to make the devices (transfer stage). The resist is removed.

Figure 4.1: Photolithographic process. Intel 45 nm SRAM cell (2006). Some reserve the term lithography only for the sacricial process of cutting the outline of the future device on the resist [7]. There are at least 3 parameters of interest in lithography. The sensitivity of the resist refers to the intensity or dose of the radiation needed in order induce sucient modication of the resist; a higher sensitivity will lead to a shorter exposure time. The contrast of the resist measures the variation of the solubility rate of the developer as a function of the exposure time; a higher contrast corresponds to a better spatial resolution of the lithographic process. The resolution or minimum size of elements is set by diraction eects (for photons) or

4.3. LITHOGRAPHY

51

collision eects (for electrons) since the latter eect causes blurring at the resist boundary. Photolithography can reach down to 80 nm in resolution, deep UV to less than 50 nm, and electron to 1 nm.

4.3.1

Transfer stage

Various processes have been developed for the transfer stage. When the structures are made by etching into the exposed regions of the mask, this is known as subtractive pattern transfer. When the sample is etched chemically by immersing into a solution (to which the substrate is reactive but not the mask), the process is known as wet etching. The process tends to be fairly rapid, with etch rate around microns per minute. There is also high specicity of the etchant and the mask material. However, it is also mostly isotropic which means that the etching can spread under the mask, leading to poor contrast; this is a disadvantage for making nanometric patterns with vertical proles. An alternative is dry etching, which involves bombarding the sample with high-energy ions (10s of eV to several keVs). These ions knock out surface atoms via elastic collisions; this phenomenon is known as sputtering. The eciency of the process is quantied via the Sigmund sputtering yield [7] 3 Ed S= , (4.1) 4 N 2 CU where C = 1.81 nm2 , N is the atomic density of the material (in atoms/cm3 ), U is the binding energy of the surface atoms (e.g., 6 eV for Si), and Ed is the energy deposited in an elastic collision between the ion and the surface (10s of eV/nm). Ions such as Ar accelerated to a few keV produces S 5 10; thus, this is a cascade process. In ion-beam etching, the ions are normally incident which generates sharp vertical proles. However, the process is inherently slow. Neither is it selective (since it is a physical process not a chemical one); hence, even the mask can be etched away. A reactive-ion etching is a combination of the wet etching and the ion-beam etching. When the structures are made by depositing new material into the openings in the resist, this is known as an additive pattern transfer. The deposition is usually a physical process, such as vacuum vapor deposition or sputtering.

4.3.2

Properties

Common types of lithography are optical, X-ray, and electron. The resolution is limited by diraction. A rule of thumb is that the resolution is given by D If n = 1, for visible light, D 250 nm. . (2n) (4.2)

52 For an electron beam:

CHAPTER 4. NANOMATERIALS: FABRICATION 1.22 (E (eV )

(nm)

(4.3)

Typical values are 0.04nm (at 1 keV) for the wavelength and a beam size of 1nm When comparing the write speed: optical is parallel, e-beam is sequential; hence, the former is faster.

4.3.3

Near-eld lithography

It uses the tip-sample interaction of a near-eld microscope to fabricate, e.g., nanowires. It modies surfaces on the atomic scale. It is not suitable for large-scale fabrication.

4.4

Epitaxial Methods

A technique that was developed in the 1970s consists in growing crystals atomic layer by atomic layer on a substrate. Such a growth technique is known as epitaxy. Three standard variations are: molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) [Fig. 4.2], metal-organo chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD), and liquid phase epitaxy (LPE). For example, instead of mixing two components as in alloying, one purposefully segregate them. The key here is that the layers can be made arbitrarily thin. An MBE reactor is an ultrahigh vacuum one (< 1010 torr).

Figure 4.2: Molecular beam epitaxy for epitaxial growth. Atomically-precise layer of Fe 3 Si on Ge (111) [APL 89, 182511 (2006)]. The elements forming the epitaxial layers are evaporated in eusion cells at the appropriate temperature and deposit onto a substrate. Controlling the temperature and the deposition time leads to an accurate control of the layer thicknesses down to single monolayer thicknesses.

4.5. CHEMICAL VAPOR DEPOSITION

53

The rst demonstration of quantum connement in a semiconductor quantum-well system was on an MBE-grown GaAs/AlGaAs nanostructure. The high-quality growth is made easy by the near lattice matching of GaAs and AlAs. Such systems also led to the discovery of the quantum Hall eect.

4.4.1

Growth morphologies

The competition between surface free energies G of the absorbate and substrate and that created at their interface determines the equilibrium shape of the absorbate. Thus, if Gsubstrate > Gabsorbate + Ginterface , (4.4)

then it is less favorable to have an uncovered surface and the absorbate will wet the substrate. Should this continue with subsequent layers to form a thin lm, the growth mode is known as Frankvan der Merwe. In some cases, competition with elastic energy due to lattice mismatch leads to subsequent island formation this is known as the StranskiKrastanov mode. If Gsubstrate < Gabsorbate + Ginterface , (4.5) then the absorbate favors 3D islands right away. This is known as the VolmerWeber mode. SK growth has been demonstrated for semiconductors (e.g., InAs/GaAsQDs) and organics. Another physical process is sputtering, whereby an inert gas is ionized then accelerated to bombard and vaporize a target.

4.5

Chemical Vapor Deposition

Chemical vapor deposition uses chemical precursors to deposit nanostructures on a substrate (Fig. 4.3). The reactor is usually either a quartz tube or a stainless steel container. Heat or plasma breaks the precursors into reactive radicals. The radicals then diuse and adsorb to the substrate. Surface chemical reactions lead to the deposition of the solid. It is generally less easy to control the growth. Organometallic compounds are often used for making III-V compounds, when a gp-III metal alkyl reacts with a gp-V metal hydride; the process is then called MOCVD. One disadvantage is the use of toxic gases.

4.6

Pulsed Laser Vaporization

Pulsed laser vaporization (PLV) is an example of a bottom-up method or self-assembly (Fig. 4.4). In this method, a laser ablates a target creating a vapor. These atoms are then

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CHAPTER 4. NANOMATERIALS: FABRICATION

Heating

Substrate

Pump

Gas inlet

Figure 4.3: CVD reactor with hot walls. carried by an inert gas (typically Ar) to a region where they deposit and form the desired nanostructure. For example, for growing ZnS nanowires, the target can be (ZnS)0.9 Au0.1 . The nanowire growth itself is catalyzed, usually Au. The most common growth mechanism is vapor-liquid-solid (VLS, Fig. 4.5), whereby the vapor diuses into the Au nanoparticle where it forms a liquid, and then supersaturates out of the catalyst to form the solid nanowire. We have seen examples of such nanowires in Fig. 2.6. A related method is where the material

Figure 4.4: Pulsed laser vaporization for semiconductor nanowire growth. of interest is thermally vaporized and then recondenses in a cooler part of the furnace.

4.7

Electrochemical Deposition

Electrochemical deposition in nanoporous template leads to metallic nanowires. Cu or Au lm is sputtered on one side of the template. The metal is deposited from solution into the

4.8. WET-CHEMICAL METHOD

55

Figure 4.5: Vapor-liquid-solid mechanism for semiconductor nanowire growth. templates pores to form the wires. One then etches the electrode lm away and dissolves the template. The wire diameter D pore size (10nm1 m), the length L template thickness (10s m), and the quantity is controlled by the pore density ( 108 cm3 ). Multisegment is obtained by changing the deposition solution or potential during growth. Examples are Ni-Au and Ni-Cu magnetic nanowires (Fig. 4.6).

4.8

Wet-chemical Method

Colloidal metallic nanoparticles (e.g., Au) are commonly made using this technique. As an example of a typical reaction, we dscribe a process for making Au nanoparticles: [8] Boil HAuCl4 with vigorous stirring using magnetic stirring hot-plate. Add Na3 citrate with stirring. The yellow soln turns dark blue, then burgundy in mins. Stir another 30 mins.

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CHAPTER 4. NANOMATERIALS: FABRICATION

Figure 4.6: TEM images of Ni/Cu multilayer nanowires. Top shows a bright-eld image of a 130 nm diameter [Ni(20 nm)/Cu(10 nm)] multilayer nanowire. Disk-shaped nickel (dark) and copper (light) segments are clearly distinguished. Middle image shows an electron energy loss spectroscopy map of two 30 nm diameter [Ni(5 nm)/Cu(5 nm)] multilayer nanowires. Lower image shows an electron energy loss spectroscopy map of a 30 nm diameter [Ni(1.5 nm)/Cu(4 nm)] multilayer nanowire.

Figure 4.7: TEM image of 12 nm colloidal Au [8].